undefined

points

[-]

In my town they ALL closed. We previously had 6; we now have a community centre where two different banks operate personal banking consultations for one workday a week each, but they only do appointments, they don’t handle cash or do any banking.

If I want to visit a branch I need to go to the next city.

by eterm1 hours ago|

prev|

[-]

When I went to a bank recently, I discovered my local high street "bank" branch is now mostly just internet kiosks with an under-trained and probably underpaid assistant there between the handful of kiosks to help people log on to it.

It is nothing like the experience of growing up in the early 90's and what banks were then.

Consider that everyone did their banking in person and people dealt with a lot of cheques. Oh, and banks didn't tend to open at weekends, you had to find time during the week.

There was a need for a lot of tellers, and banks were incredibly busy places.

"99% closed" is obviously hyperbole, especially counting by branch, but if you were to count by tellers or by people visiting their bank, I could well believe it.

by TFNA2 hours ago|

prev|

[-]

Not just a matter of binary open/closed, though. In some countries now, in branches that remain open have slashed staff, leading to very long waiting times or the need to book an appointment in advance. Very different physical-location landscape than 15 years ago.

by denkmoon1 hours ago|

parent|

[-]

Can't speak to the UK experience but in Australia, the nature of in-branch assistance has changed but IMO for the better. No more standing in line waiting for Nanna to get her pension out. I book an appointment online, rock up, get my limit raised or whatever, bam done.

by shoo1 hours ago|

prev|

[-]

Here's a recent article from the FT [1] (paywalled):

> Across the country, there are now barely 4,000 bank and building society branches, down 80 per cent in 40 years.

So, a big decline, but still 20x as many high street banks than what a 99% decline claims.

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/10ce1086-a9ae-4851-92e4-3b6efc8a0...